Wednesday, May 13, 2015

From ‘The Wisdom of Compassion. Stories of Remarkable Encounters and Timeless Insights’ by His Holiness the Dalai Lama and Victor Chan

“Some mysterious things certainly there,” the Dalai Lama continued his reply to the rabbi. “We believe that these so-called higher beings have more energy than us. At a practical level, much depend on our own effort. If our effort comes, then some of these positive energies, I think, we can connect. From the Buddhist viewpoint, these higher beings develop higher energy because of their practice of altruism….”

“……reincarnation………If you ask me what explanation Buddhism? Then I will say: life after life. This physical body, together with our grosser mind, cease to exist. But our main mind, this means our more subtle mind, will continue. Another life begins.”

…the Dalai Lama has himself witnessed certain phenomena that his rational mind finds hard to explain…..the death of his senior tutor, Ling Rinpoche, who died at the age of eighty-one …… Although Ling Rinpoche was clinically dead – his breathing had stopped and there was no pulse – he remained in some form of meditation for thirteen days. During this time, the area around his heart remained warm, and his body, unmoving in a meditative pose, showed no signs of deterioration. On the last day, his head dropped and a small amount of blood escaped from his nostrils. The Dalai Lama believed that it was only then that Ling Rinpoche’s consciousness finally left his body.